The holidays can be an especially difficult time for children with divorced parents. It’s a lot to juggle spending time with both parents.

What would you do if one parent wanted to spend most of the day with you but you wanted to split the time between your parents more evenly?

This Redditor shares her struggle to communicate with her father, and he takes offense to her visitation timing request.

Read the story below to learn more.

AITA for asking to stay one more hour at my mum’s on Christmas from my dad?

Hey everyone, so for a bit of context, I (18F) have Level-2 autism and don’t really handle being yelled at particularly well, plus I tend to avoid conflict. This also happens every Christmas, except for last one, where he got COVID.

My parents (53F & 51M) are also divorced and have been divorced since I was in year 3, and they haven’t been on speaking terms since.

But the OP maintains a much closer relationship with her mother.

I’ve also been living with my mum, without swapping weeks, since about 2021. It was my decision after a large argument I got into with my dad after my at-the-time doctor labeled him as being abusive.

So onto the story, about a week before Christmas, my dad called me up and insisted on picking me up at 12 p.m., which I’ve always tended to hate since I never get enough time to talk to my mum’s side of the family.

This is when the woman voiced her holiday visitation preference.

I asked him if I could have more time, like an hour or two, which was when he started screaming at me over the phone.

During this conversation, he mainly calls me stupid for not understanding “street smarts,” and how my mum is clearly “drugged up and convincing her ex to be her drug dealer” (my mum’s ex was going to be at the party because my half sister’s children being there).

But the father’s inappropriate behavior didn’t stop there…

He proceeded to dismiss the time one of my doctors called him abusive before I eventually gave up and gave into the idea of being picked up 12 p.m., despite being obviously upset about it (I was crying because of him yelling at me).

After that, we left it there until Christmas Eve, where I asked my mum if she could try convincing him, which although she agreed, it didn’t help.

And then the “big day” rolled around…

So moving to today, I woke up and had a missed call from my dad, so I called him back up where we said Merry Christmas to each other before I asked about having more time at Mum’s again.

He got angry at this and proceeded to scream at me.

But I stood my ground and insisted on 1 – 2 p.m. and not going at 12 p.m.

But then, this father did something really extreme.

This resulted in him deciding to cancel the Christmas plans I had with him because he “makes my life miserable” (I didn’t say this. I said not seeing the rest of my [mum’s family] for more than 30 minutes sours my mood for the rest of the day). [He, then, gave] me the silent treatment and hung up on me.

This was after I said that the earliest I’m going is 1 p.m. before.

I don’t care about how he thinks it’s unfair that Mum “gets more hours over the year” because I’m not even covered my child support anymore, and he’s technically getting more of the day, regardless, on Christmas.

This left the OP feeling frazzled and confused over a visitation she had planned a lot for.

Honestly, I’m just a bit confused over this whole situation. I still want to see him, as I had presents I handmade for him, which [I] probably won’t even be [able to] give. I don’t even really care about my presents.

I just want to spend more time with some of my family that I only usually see only on Christmas.

She’s also unsure if she should feel guilty.

I’m not sure if I’m in the wrong anymore or what to thing about this. If I am in the wrong, I will apologise, but I’m pretty sure that he’s not bluffing about canceling Christmas knowing him — so, Reddit, AITA?

Also, apologies for bad formatting. I’m on mobile.

Does Reddit side with the OP on this one or is it only fair to obey the father’s wishes? Let’s read the comments below to get an idea.

Overwhelmingly, Redditors said “NTA.”

They even sent positive vibes.

One commenter suggested she seek professional help on the matter.

And another said this father’s behavior is unacceptable.

This woman did nothing wrong, and her father might not be a good person for her to be around anymore.

If you thought that was an interesting story, check this one out about a man who created a points system for his inheritance, and a family friend ends up getting almost all of it.